Paris Apartments

Sunday, 4 October 2009

In Paris, an individual spends around 85 minutes travelling each day, with the majority of this time on passed on public transport. As around 25% of Parisians are single, these daily commutes would seem to offer an ideal opportunity for lonely hearts to meet. Fortunately, two young men are on hand to ensure that cupid travels with them.

“Whenever we talk about the project, people always want to know two things; why we do it and whether it works” Timothée Peignier, co-founder of a website called croisedanslemetro.com tells me. The site gives individuals who caught a glimpse of a potential future love of their life on public transport the chance to find that person again. The result is a list of touching, but often sad messages from people now desperate to initiate communication but with little hope of succeeding. So does it work?

“Honestly, we don’t know” replies Tristan Daeschner, the other co-founder. “In any case we consider this aspect to be part of people’s private lives. Our objective was just to give them the means and the opportunity to meet” he adds.

After placing a message on the website, the individual later receives any replies directly at their given e-mail address. Timothée and Tristan will know the number of replies an individual has received, but the contents of these messages remains a secret.

The service has now been running for a little over 6 months and has spread to other cities around France and Belgium. London and New York should follow soon – once the creators have found a suitable translation for the website name!* However, each time they launch a new city, there are a whole series of cultural and sociological questions to answer. Who takes public transport in these cities and how do people react to each other? As an example, Lyon has taken well to the service, but the inhabitants of Marseille still seem reluctant. “For New York, maybe we'll have tolaunch croisedansletaxi.com” wonders Timothée.

The question that springs to mind is why Parisians, notorious romantics and ‘dragueurs’ should need such a service. A false notion believe the two young men. “People in Paris are as timid as anyone else on public transport” says Tristan. Perhaps it is the fear of being rejected in front of a packed carriage of fellow commuters, or perhaps there is just a simple respect of distance in this crowded environment. Whatever the reason is, it is a service that seems to have found its place in this city.

Why did the two men start the service though? “Obviously we were inspired by other services such as the letters in the free Metro newspaper and the Missed Connections section of Craigslist. We felt though that there was no dedicated web service available for this subject, and as we both work in the internet industry, we thought that we’d launch something in our spare time”. Curiously, they have no plan to earn any money from their service beyond covering the expenses of the site. In fact, one could almost conclude that the two are romantics and are happy to act simply as a free dating agency. They are so inspired by the project that they constantly thinking of ways to improve the concept. A 'live' iPhone service has been postponed because the technology is not yet in place underground, but other spin-offs may soon appear. "We would like to print some of the messages on paper and hand them out on the Metro" says Tristan. "We also thought about getting an actor to read out some of the messages too" he adds.

Beyond the worthy intentions of the site creators, it is the messages themselves that have become the star of the show. They are a poetic account of life in today's big cities, providing a snapshot of brief encounters; two people who shared eye contact and exchanged smiles but who never quite managed to meet and talk. Sprinkled throughout the messages are words of regret, expressing how the scene could have played out differently, and a general despair that the tongue is more discreet than the eyes. However, there are some messages that simply celebrate the beauty of the moment, with the authors not even looking for any kind of follow-up.

For the two creators of croisedanslemetro.com, the quality of the messages was more of a pleasant surprise. "We didn't really expect the messages to be so poetic at first" explains Timothée, "but now we want it to be a mark of our service. Visitors to the site can now rate the quality of the messages, and we think that this will help us to encourage more people to use the site". By doing this, they also hope to avoid the slightly seedy side that could have crept in. A few dubious visitors have appeared, but they are quickly identified and warned away.

So if you are looking for love, are there any particular parts of the city in which you should travel? "We haven't noticed any patterns so far" says Tristan Daeschner. "Of course, the Line 1 and Montparnasse and Saint Lazare, the busiest places, have seen the most encounters, but it seems that this kind of thing can happen anywhere at anytime". And is there any particular age or sex? "Not at all" says Timothée Peignier. "It can be man looking to contact a woman, a woman looking for a man, a man who wants to find another man he saw, and we even had quite a mature lady who was looking to contact a young girl she'd seen on the Metro. She said that it was a sentiment she'd never had before". Perhaps proof then that anything is possible on public transport in Paris!

*Literally ‘crossed in the metro’ as it stands. If you can think of a word that implies a fleeting, wordless encounter, make your suggestion in the comments below and I’ll pass it on to them!

Secondly, a quick mention about the the logo (see above) and website, excellent work by a young designer called Lorena Foucher. The logo was transformed into a sticker which the two site creators stuck to the end of the Metro maps in the carriages as a means of promoting their service. Many people noticed the stickers and several connected to the site specifically to request copies, which they then themselves later placed on their journeys. This communication is about the closest that the two co-founders have got to their users so far, but they are still hopeful that they will soon receive news of a happy reunion!

AS you should be aware, there is a very strict "rule" when using public transportation in Paris (and several other French cities)....you do not make eye contact with another passenger. And you certainly NEVER are rude enough to strike up a conversation.

Artsparker: Thanks for the link. I didn't know 'Missed Connections' on Craigslist before meeting these guys, but I've looked at it since and for me it doesn't have the same poetry at all. I guess if you were really looking for someone you'd leave a message on all of the available services, but croisedanslemetro seems to be just a little more artistic and romantic. Is it because the messages are in French?

Starman: I think you are missing a subtlety here. Yes, you never strike up a conversation with a stranger on the Metro, but the eye contact game is completely different. It is not direct, but a friend once told me how she played it - catch someone's eye, then look away. If that person then looks back at you again straight afterwards, a connection has been made. In general though most Parisiennes like to be looked at, but will rarely look themselves!

Very happy to find this, however, I had a similar situation today on an Air France bus 4 coming from CDG to Gare de Lyon, the girl continued to Montparnasse. How can I classify this on the site? Wish there was more options rather than just the subway lines.